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Writer's pictureLinda Beatrice Brown

The Birch Butterfly





The Birch Butterfly

The Birch Butterfly hibernates in the Arctic ice

Completely motionless until spring thaw

when it awakens.

Hiding in the ice until the thaw,

A butterfly surveys the frozen time.

Some say one flutter of the wings could change the world.

Some say one flutter of her wings could change the ice of violence.

Her wings are miracles

For what great movement of the planet does she hesitate?

Has she the strength to start a thaw of frozen spirit strong enough to save us from ourselves?

Her wings are miracles thin as golden tissue paper,

Yet she holds her breath, her only safety in the circle Dante knew as hell.

What offering, what gift, what glint of moonrise can call her forth?

We need this golden insect now.

Seconds move as slow as ice that crawls toward the next millennium.

We need her golden brilliance and her breath.

We need her stirring.

What flutter of her wings will send its ripples out into the winds

and so reform our chaos, call it order, let us start again?

We need her stirring and her breath to posit to the world that

it is simple—peace is possible.

If it is true that there exists an insect that can turn the tide, then peace is possible.

© Copyright Linda Beatrice Brown

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